Guangzhou Uprising
On 11 December 1927, the political leadership of the CCP
ordered about 20,000 communist-leaning soldiers and armed
workers to organize a "Red Guard" and take over
Guangzhou. The uprising occurred despite the strong
objections of communist military commanders such as Ye Ting,
Ye Jianying and Xu Xiangqian, as the communists were badly
armed - just 2,000 of the insurgents had rifles.
Nevertheless, rebel forces captured most of the city within
hours using the element of surprise, despite a huge numerical
and technical advantage held by government troops. The
communist leaders officially renamed the city's political
structure the "Soviet of Workers, Soldiers and Peasant
Deputies" or "Guangzhou Soviet". After this
initial success for the communists, however, the 15,000
National Revolutionary Army (NRA) troops in the area moved
into the city and started to push back the insurgents. After
five more NRA divisions arrived in Guangzhou, the uprising
was quickly crushed. The insurgents suffered heavy
casualties, while the survivors had to flee the city or go
into hiding. The Comintern, especially Neumann, were later
blamed for insisting that the communists had to hold onto
Guangzhou at all cost. Zhang Tailei, the leading Red Guard
organizer, was killed in an ambush as he returned from a
meeting. The takeover dissolved by the early morning of
December 13, 1927.
In the resulting purges, many young communists were
executed and the Guangzhou Soviet became known as the
"Canton Commune", "Guangzhou Commune" or
"Paris Commune of the East"; it lasted only a short
time at the cost of more than 5,700 communists dead and an
equal number missing. Around 8 p.m. on 13 December, the
Soviet consulate in Guangzhou was surrounded and all its
personnel were arrested. In the accident the consulate
diplomats Ukolov, Ivanov and others were killed. Ye Ting, the
military commander, was scapegoated, purged and blamed for
the failure, despite the fact that the obvious disadvantages
of the communist force was the main cause of the defeat, as
Ye Ting and other military commanders had correctly pointed
out. Enraged by his unjustified treatment, Ye Ting left China
and went into exile in Europe, not returning until nearly a
decade later.
Despite being the third failed uprising of 1927, and
reducing the morale of the communists, it encouraged further
uprisings across China.
